Can Hip-Hop be artistic and capable with piss-poor subject matter? I ask this because I think people generally think garbage Hip-Hop is Hip-Hop that isn’t “about” anything, meaning it’s about drugs, pussy, alcohol, murder and conspicuous consumption instead of real issues and affirmations that young Black kids need to hear.
For all my bitching about Hip-Hop at large, I can’t say that topicality has ever been the main issue with me, but I’d rather hear a Slum Village song about pussy than a Soulja Boy song about pussy. That’s pretty much how I delineate these matters. In fact, I listen to quite a bit of Hip-Hop from the underbelly that people may think is “positive” just because it’s non-mainstream, but it’s not. We like to fit things into boxes that make them easier to contextualize. I remember when Erykah Badu wore a dread wig post-Baduizm and everyone shit their pants like it was some kind of grand betrayal, but there was nothing in Badu’s earlier work that implied authenticity based on her hair. How could someone so “real” do something so “fake?”
Same goes for how we perceive Hip-Hop. While it may be true that a more talented artist has a deep well of topics from which to cull material, don’t think for a moment that talent (i.e. “embodying the true spirit of Hip-Hop”) equates messianic intent or even depth. It just means a cat has an innate ability to flip vocabulary and become a part of the music and that his skills aren’t founded strictly in entrepreneurialism and attention-whoring. On the same token, there’s still some shitty Hip-Hop with noble intentions. You can impart all manner of hope and knowledge and positivity and seek refuge in your intentions, but if you lack lyrical panache then your output holds less currency with me than “Every Girl.”
Viva la Pussy Rap!